Tag: words

Spiritual Deception in the Highest 19.3

How do we wrap up the wording of the KJV section? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Again, I am leaving a lot of stuff out that is tedious as it is just doing things like counting the number of syllables. This chapter ends with some odds and ends and we’re going to go ahead and get to those. As always, the source material can be found here.

Not only does the King James use simpler words, but it also uses a shorter vocabulary of ‘different’ words. In his book “The Majority Text”, Theodore Letis points out:

“The AV contains only about six thousand words as compared to Shakespeare’s fifteen to twenty thousand and Milton’s thirteen thousand …”

Okay. And? Even if I grant this as true, what follows from this? What is asked is not how many different words are used but how easy those words are to understand. There are times fewer words are better and there are times more words are better. It depends on the situation. For instance, we don’t want to have endless vocabulary lists to learn to say something, but meanwhile, Greek has four different words for love and we only have one to contain everything.

What about the King James’ words we don’t recognize? G.A. Riplinger responds to this question:

“The … words in the KJV, which are unfamiliar, at first glance, to dictionary shy Americans are actually simpler and more accurate than their new substitutes. A ‘stomacher’ for example (Isa. 3:24) is NOT a belt, as new versions indicate, but a chest ornament. (It seems the only ‘simpler’ words in new versions are incorrect or from a corrupt Greek text.) New versions not only do not improve the KJV’s ‘sackbut’ (Daniel 3:7), calling it a ‘trigon’, but in the same sentence change the KJV’s simple ‘harp’ to a ‘zither’

This seems like a bizarre argument. How do I know that a stomacher is a chest ornament? I went to Blue Letter Bible to look up the verse and found that it says it’s a robe. Maybe it’s right. Maybe it’s a belt. Since this is the only place the word shows up in Scripture, it’s harder to tell.

It’s hard to understand how replacing one difficult term, a sackbut, with another difficult term, a trigon, is an argument. It amounts to “Well they do it to!” This doesn’t deal with the wording of the KJV. As for harp, the word is best translated as a lyre or zither.

But supposedly Riplinger has dealt with the whole argument by citing two verses. Well done.

A second claim is that: ‘thee’, ‘thou’, ‘thy’, and ‘thine’ are out of date. The ‘pitch’ is that these words were spoken in 1611, are archaic, and need to be eliminated.

Let’s examine this claim. In his book ‘The King James Version Defended’, Edward F. Hills gives us some interesting insight into these words. On page 218, he says:

“… the English of the King James Version is not the English of the 17th century … It is Biblical English, which was not used on ordinary occasions even by the translators who produced the King James Version. As H. Wheeler Robinson (1940) pointed out, one need only compare the preface written by the translators with the text of their translation to feel the difference in style … The King James Version … owes its merit, not to 17th century English – which was very different – but to its faithful translation of the original. Its style is that of the Hebrew and the New Testament Greek. Even in their use of thee and thou the translators were not following 17th century English usage but biblical usage, for at the time these translators were doing their work these singular forms had already been replaced by the plural you in polite conversation” [S12P218].

In his book ‘The Old Is Better’, Alfred E. Levell also comments on the need for thee’s and thou’s. On page 31, he says:

“Why did the AV translators not adopt the up to date English of their time? For one reason … accuracy of translation! Whenever the Hebrew and Greek texts use the singular of the pronoun, so does the AV; and whenever those texts use the plural, so does the AV … There is a distinct loss of accuracy in translation if ‘You’ is used for singular as well as the plural: it becomes an ambiguous word … Thus in Luke 22:31-32 the Lord says to Peter “Satan hath desired to have you, to sift you as wheat,” “you” here referring to Peter and the other disciples; “But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not,” “thee” and “thy” referring to Peter only. Such shades in meaning are completely lost when ‘you’ is used throughout” [S13P31].

The words: ‘thee’, ‘thou’, ‘thy’ and ‘thine’ are clearly needed. The Holy Spirit picked these words for a reason: It is to distinguish the ‘singular you’ from the ‘plural you’ for the purpose of clarity. Praise God!

I can easily grant this shows a lack in our language today. At the same time, that doesn’t mean we still speak in thee and thou today. (Gotta love the statement that this is what the Holy Spirit chose, something I am sure the KJV translators would not want said.) It’s one reason in my recent Greek classes we even talked about how in the South we differ between you and y’all.

Objective, analytical, data shows new versions are NOT EASIER to read, they are HARDER. Also, new versions are wordier, have more syllables per word, and use harder words.

The words God chose, for His Traditional Majority Text, are simpler. And, like the use of ‘thee’, ‘thou’, ‘thy’ and ‘thine’; each word was chosen for a reason. We may or may not understand each word, but it is there for a purpose; just like you and I are here for a purpose.

Lately; Bible publishers are trying to tell Christians the King James Bible is ‘hard to understand’. Their ‘claim’ is that we need to buy a ‘new version’.

Well, if the King James Bible is ‘hard to understand’, then this is a very, very, RECENT phenomenon. Our grandparents were able to read the King James!

And, how would Bible publishers explain this supposed problem with King James ‘readability’ when we are actually MORE EDUCATED than our grandparents?

No; their claim does not make sense. Something else is wrong.

And meanwhile, our great-great-great grandparents down the line were able to read Elizabethan English. Our older ancestors were able to read languages like Greek and Latin and Hebrew. People can read different things at different times due to the changes in language.

The truth is that the King James Bible is NOT the problem.

“The real gap is one of distance between God and man, not a lapse between us and Father Time … The spiritual chasm is so vast that even those close to Jesus could not understand him. He was NOT speaking archaic Aramaic to Mary and Joseph yet, “they understood NOT the saying which he spake unto them”. Obsolete words were NOT the obstacle when he asked Peter, “Are ye also yet WITHOUT understanding?” [S3P635].

Something to think about.

And many of the great heroes in the Bible didn’t understand, including Mary and Joseph, the apostles, and others in the Old Testament. Are we to assume that all of these figures didn’t understand because they were obstinate in sin?

I am not against the KJV if one prefers it and wants to use it. I am against saying it is the only one you should use and all others are wicked translations.

But we’ll go on next time.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

I Was Not Assigned

What is at stake with our words? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Last week, there was an announcement made at the chapel service here at NOBTS about free flu shots being given out for students. All we had to do was go to the student center and there would be some nurses there ready to give us our shots. Being one without health insurance now (Financial realities of being a seminary student), I decided to go and get one.

Now this was a Christian hospital organization that was giving out the shots and so they had to ask me several questions, which I understand. I get the legal requirements. I don’t blame them and I realize the sad reality of what many businesses are going through, but as an individual, I did take a firm stand.

So in the middle of the usual questions that I expect, I get the one of “What is your gender identity?” I consider this to really be a nonsense question. Identity has no purpose here. How I feel about myself does not affect what I am at all. I can feel like I’m a cat and it’s not going to change I’m a human. For a more realistic example, as one going through a divorce, I can feel numerous negative things many times. Those things are not true. Many Christians can struggle with feeling God doesn’t love them. Doesn’t make it true. The reason many people commit suicide is often connected with a negative feeling about them or their future that just isn’t true.

I am a man. That is it. I can take a look at my body and the way that I came out and realize that yes, I am a man.

My next question I was asked was “Were you assigned that at birth?”

At this I think my eyes glare, not in anger at the nurses. They have to do their job. It’s in anger that this question is on here. I gave a direct answer. “No. I was born a man.” I realize we could say I was born a boy who grew into a man, but the sex that I was born as was not something that was just decided. It was known when I was born.

I also realize some people can bring up people who are intersex, but intersex and transgender are two very different things. One is a very physical condition and we have never sought to change our laws and society based on this condition. The other, transgenderism, is a psychological delusion and we are changing our society and laws to play along and real people are being the victims.

Friends. This is a hill we cannot budge any on. This is about a battle for reality itself. I consider the far-left movement in our society to be in a war against reality and trying to eliminate any idea of male and female. It’s as if we are being pushed into a political monism.

The biggest aspect of this battle to watch is our words. I will use longer and clunkier terminology to avoid granting any grounds to the other side. I will not speak of a “same-sex marriage.” A marriage by definition is the unity of a man and a woman. No. Something like polygamy doesn’t change this, though it is wrong, as it is just one man with several women, but the man-woman aspect is there. The same would be for one woman with many men.

When you say “same-sex marriage” you are speaking of a contradiction. You are speaking of a man-woman unit that is not man-woman. If we also make the definition of marriage fluid, we can make it to mean anything and then it means nothing. Why limit it to two people? Why make it consensual? Why make it lifelong? The word marriage has to mean something specific.

I prefer to not even speak of a homosexual anymore. It makes homosexual more often an aspect of the person’s identity and surely that won’t change. It becomes something innate. I will easily instead speak of a person with same-sex attraction. What is central here is that this is a person.

We must absolutely watch people who want to control our words and tell us there are things we cannot say. We have seen part of this when any monitoring is done of questions about vaccines or the 2020 election. Even if you think both of those are crazy conspiracy theories, it would be better to have them talked about and the ideas discussed. Shutting down discussion on any topic convinces more often people who think there is a cover-up.

Keep in mind that in 1984, the goal of the editing of the language was not to come up with new words. It was to eliminate as many words as possible. Control the words people say and you can control the ideas that they are allowed to think about.

The language war is essential.

No. I was not assigned male at birth. I was born that way. I could jack up my body with as many hormones as doctors say and mutilate it with surgical procedures, and I will look like I am playing a part, but it won’t change reality. Barring the return of Jesus Christ, I will die a male. Nothing will change that.

There is too much at stake. Whenever you encounter language that is meant to shape what you think, do not give an inch to it. If you have to use long and clunkier phrases, that’s fine. I would rather do that and be minorly inconvenienced than give in to fake reality and be majorly inconvenienced.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)